Console Monster’s Games of 2007

There is not long left until we make that lasting imprint on the sofa, while we watch endless re-runs and Christmas editions of our favourite TV episodes, stuffing our faces with bottomless boxes of chocolates and dusting off the Jenga box for its annual outing amongst the family. That’s right, Christmas is fast approaching and what better time to bring you our Top Five games of the year and hand out a couple of Monster Awards for the games that deserve it this year. So if you have yet to pop into town and do that last minute shopping spree, let us indulge you with the games you should be buying your sons or daughters, brothers or sisters, and even husbands and wives this festive holiday.

Console Monster’s Top Five Games of 2007

This year has been a great year for gamers, with all genres fully covered. From Halo3 to Call of Duty 4, Assassin’s Creed to BioShock, it has been a tricky to gather together and vote for only our favourite five games of 2007.

What we have done this year is to have all Console Monster staff vote their top five games of 2007, we then collected these up and gave each points, #1 getting 5 points and #5 getting 1 points, this then gave our overall total which has lead to some interesting results, so let’s start to build up some hype and start with number five…

Half-Life 2: Orange Box (Xbox 360)

This year, Valve released a bundle of titles all wrapped up in one “Orange” box. This gave gamers the chance to play the entire Half-Life 2 series, including its two recent episodes. We also had the interesting but short lived, Portal, and the long awaited and a little crazy, Team Fortress 2. All these games provided great value for money for any gamer yet to witness the Half-Life 2 series for themselves.

We gave this game 95% in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360 version.

Our favourite moustached plumper jumps his way on to the Nintendo Wii. Super Mario Galaxy warps you back to when you were a child, charming you with its simple, imaginative gameplay, amazing level design and tremendous amount of variety—all the while sticking to the core Mario formula that we all know and love. If you are looking for a reason to buy a Nintendo Wii, this is it. Super Mario Galaxy is simply a stunning achievement and should be experienced by anyone that calls themselves a gamer.

We gave this game 99% in our review – Click here to read our review for the game.

After a ton of hype, Assassin’s Creed made it in stores in November and took our breath away with its scalable environments that made us enjoy the ability to free-run across rooftops and ledges, riding horses and piercing our foes through the jugular. Its story, expansive cities, atmospheric audio and gorgeous graphics cancelled out its much repetitive gameplay, and its ending left us just wanting to know more.

We gave this game 90% (Xbox 360) and 79% (PS3) in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360 version and Click here for our impressions of the PS3 version.

In joint third place from our collection of votes we have Halo 3, probably the most anticipated title of the year for the Xbox 360. Releasing in the later part of the year, Halo 3 was snapped up by every man and his dog, if their dog owned an Xbox 360 that is. Gamers were asked to “Finish the Fight” and they certainly did in their millions. With the single player campaign leaving many gamers unfulfilled, it was in its multiplayer that rains true to the franchise and with the added features, modes and online stat tracking under the hood, if you are in to your multiplayer gaming, then this is the game for your Xbox 360 this year.

We gave this game 98% in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360.

This is not a typo, we have a third joint entry in our top five games of 2007, this being Call of Duty 4. Since CoD2 released, Infinity Ward have been busy with their next title, a title that would see you battle in modern warfare surroundings, weapons and equipment, and bring a whole new lease on life to the military combat FPS genre. Infinity Ward and Activision are now back this year with a new spin on their fourth title for the Call of Duty franchise – Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat. With a short but enticing single player campaign, and a rich and enjoyable multiplayer to rival Halo 3, Call of Duty 4 is one title to have in your Xbox 360 or PS3’s collection of games this year.

We gave this game 95% in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360 version.

After many years in development, and seeing this title slip down the release date ladder many times, it was great to finally see Mass Effect release this year. With a deep and involving storyline, stunning characters and draw dropping visuals, Mass Effect will keep you busy for a good solid 20 hours, some will say that is short for an RPG but if you are a casual gamer that enjoys real-time based combat in your RPGS, or you are just entering this genre, then you can’t go wrong with BioWare’s masterpiece. In what seems to be a trilogy for this franchise, we cannot wait to see and play more.

We gave this game 95% in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360.

Our top game of the year goes to BioShock, which became an icon of discussion for the majority of gamers this year and brought gamers truly into the world of Rapture. Bioshock is a complete package, it covers every aspect of a fantastic game flawlessly, and one should always save the best for last. Graphically, Bioshock is simply outstanding. The graphics are equally measured by fantastic technical excellence, showing without a doubt the best water effects in any game and an art style that flows throughout the city of Rapture. Fantastic art direction meets the latest in graphics technology, creating an environment that is packed with terror, personality, atmosphere and endless charm. Even though its replay value maybe limited, the journey throughout the game is an experience every gamer should experience.

We gave this game 96% in our review – Click here to read our review for the Xbox 360.

About The Author

Anthony BarkerAnthony is the designer, developer and owner of Console Monster. In his spare time, Anthony is a keen gamer who enjoys playing mostly First-Person Shooters and Racing games. When he is not developing games or tweaking this site, Anthony likes to be on the slopes snowboarding or hurtling down off-road tracks on his mountain bike.